Chapter 3. Before Maris
BEFORE: MARIS
The air was full of rose and spice.
I wove through the market with quick steps, sending a glance to the sundial’s shadow cast on the outer wall of the Illyrium.
The morning’s tribunal had gone long, and while Priestess Ophelius didn’t like it when I was late, she also wouldn’t let me through the doors of the temple on a feast day without an offering.
Carts filled with silk, bread, and herbs littered the walkway where the citizens of the Citadel District were haggling over wares in their own preparations for the festivities.
There would be parties, rituals, and ceremonial gatherings for the next three days to observe the First Feast, honoring the goddess Eris, keeper of life itself.
Once the sun set, a new year would begin.
When I spotted the cart I was looking for, I tugged the length of my chiton higher, turning to the side to wedge myself through the crowd.
A hunchbacked woman was perched on a stool over a collection of jars that glowed like liquid gold in the sunlight.
Large slices of honeycomb were suspended inside, the bright amber color signifying them as a delicacy from the most remote coastland meadows.
The honey was tinged with the scent of orange blossoms, the very fruit that the goddess Eris used to divine the future.
I already had my drachmas in hand, studying the jars carefully before I chose one. Eris would receive countless offerings in the next few days, and if I wanted to garner her favor for the year ahead, I needed a gift that would stand out among the others.
As soon as I plucked one from the cart, the coins were clattering on the table and I pushed back toward the bridge with the honey clutched to my chest. The market edged along the outer wall of the baths, and from the look of it, they were full.
The steam lifted into the air behind the carved stone walls, where the Citadel District’s residents were preparing for the events that would go well into the night.
My mother would spend her afternoon in our family’s private chamber there, being bathed by our servant Iola before her skin was scrubbed with herb-scented salts.
By sundown she’d be covered in the glow of rare oils, her hair intricately braided and dotted with jewels.
Our family had been given the honor of hosting this year’s First Feast for the Magistrates, and my mother had had Iola polish her obsidian mirror weeks ago.
There was no room for anything but perfection tonight.
Not when the whole of the Forum would be in attendance.
Scores of people were streaming in from the Lower City, on their way to work in the villas and shop fronts of the Citadel District.
By nightfall, every window would be illuminated with firelight, the celebrations drowned in wine.
The Lower City would have to wait until the residents of the Citadel District were sleeping off their drunken stupor to hold their own parties.
Two men with large wooden dowels propped on their shoulders barreled up the bridge, nearly knocking me into the street lantern as they passed. A gutted pig carcass was strung up between them, its hooves bound, ready for roasting. The smell of the raw flesh made my stomach turn.
When I finally made it across the river, I walked faster, sweat beading between my shoulder blades.
The courtyard of the Illyrium was bursting with people who’d come to collect the blessed water in the fountain.
It was the only temple in the city dedicated to all twelve gods, and on feast days, people lined up for half a mile along the river, ceramic vessels cradled in their arms or dangling from ropes.
Tonight, they would be placed at the doorways of every home so that guests could cleanse themselves before paying homage to Eris.
I took the stairs up to the Illyrium’s entrance, where a marble carving of the three faces of the god Phaedo painted a shadow on the steps.
The huge marble walls of the temple blocked out the noise of the city, and the thick smell of incense curled softly in the air.
The great hall was lined with enormous statues of the gods that watched with empty eyes as I crossed the polished floor with quiet steps.
In the three years I’d been a novice to Ophelius, the Illyrium had become a second home.
A place where I found myself moving by memory.
I passed the chamber that housed the temple smith, where he worked over the smoldering forge.
The sound of water on hot gold hissed as he cooled a newly made medallion, sending a metallic scent into the hall.
I slipped off my sandals and went to the nearest stone washing bowl, where cold, perfumed water from the fountain outside was replaced every hour.
The customs of entering the temple had been ingrained in me since I could walk, even if my mother had never had much reverence for the gods.
I scrubbed my hands and arms methodically before I washed my face.
My feet were next, dipped into the hammered bronze troughs along the wall, and then I pulled back my hair from my face, tying it at the nape of my neck.
The perfume of quince and rosemary replaced the dusty smell of the city that clung to my skin, washing away the last bit of the outside world before I entered the inner chamber of the temple.
I held the jar of honey in both hands as I stepped inside, where Ophelius was already standing at the altar.
Her long silver hair trailed down the center of her back, her shoulders square beneath a robe embroidered with a shimmering gold thread that had been spun with godsblood.
It was the one she wore only on feast days.
She didn’t turn to greet me when she heard me coming, but she didn’t turn to greet me.
She never did. I came up the aisle with steps slow enough to be considered respectful and dropped to the ground to press my forehead to the stone.
But when I rose and saw what Ophelius was doing, I all but ran to the altar.
She had the ceremonial knife clutched in one hand, suspended in the air as she watched her wrist drain into the porcelain bowl before her.
“You started without me,” I rasped, setting the jar of honey down haphazardly and pulling up the sleeves of my robe.
“You are late,” she said, letting me take the knife. It was carved from the bone of a whale with a design of gentle waves that commemorated the sea. The shining blade was smeared with godsblood.
I took over the ritual with quick hands, setting down the knife and taking Ophelius’ arm to balance it over the bowl.
The blood that dripped from her wrist was laced with the metallic sheen that signified the magic of the gods.
The deep crimson glimmered as the light touched it, as if gold dust had been stirred into it.
The altar was stacked high with bundles of basil, baskets of pomegranates, and strings of garlic. A sea of gold and silver drachmas had also been littered throughout in an offering to Eris.
Ophelius’ eyes lifted to the tapestry strung up above the altar as her wrist dripped.
A flock of doves was depicted in the scene there, little golden halos stitched in godsblood thread set atop each of their heads.
The symbol identified them as those who were gifted by the gods, a distinction that could come in the form of a mark like this one or even an object that had been given to a mortal.
Whatever the gifts, their meaning was the same.
They were bestowed only upon those who’d been chosen to enact the will of the gods.
But the days of the gifts had long been over.
“Recite the story,” Ophelius said, waiting.
I exhaled, wondering if the test was meant to punish me for being late.
The Twelve Feasts took place on the first day of each month, with a different god or goddess honored as the seasons passed.
It was a time for telling stories and recounting the history of Isara, and by now I knew most of them by heart.
I studied the tapestry, eyeing the details of the background.
The only words were written in the first language, which Ophelius had refused to teach me.
She insisted that there was no good that could come of speaking to the gods in their own tongue.
But I could tell the scene was a banquet.
A long table was set with a feast, and the doves hovered over the heads of the gods who were seated there.
I recognized the imagery but couldn’t quite place them in a sequence of events.
“I do not know it, Priestess,” I said.
I didn’t have to see her face to know she was disappointed in me. In three years, the woman had never criticized or praised me. That wasn’t her job. It didn’t matter that I was the daughter of one of the most powerful women in the city. As a novice in this temple, my only function was to learn.
Ophelius’ eyes moved from one dove to another. “The goddess Aster was at war with a greater god, Remillion. But she lacked the strength to conquer him.”
Aster. The goddess of war, the very one to whom the city of Isara was consecrated. It wasn’t the typical kind of story that was revisited on the First Feast, especially since the feast was dedicated to Eris. Not Aster. She wasn’t honored until the Twelfth Feast.
“She’d been parted from her sister, Eris, throughout the fight. But when she heard that Eris was to marry the god Toranus, Aster took seven perfect white doves from the sky and sent them to Eris as a wedding gift.”
My gaze trailed over the golden halos that crested the delicate brows of the birds.
“Eris accepted the generous gift,” Ophelius continued, “instructing her servants to bake the doves into pies for the wedding feast. But upon taking the first bite, Eris fell dead, as did her entire wedding party.”